


Heaven

by aches



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Childhood Friends, Friends to Lovers, Homophobia, M/M, One Shot, Rich Jaemin, Rich Jeno, Short One Shot, and Nomin is more than adorable, i'm whipped for nct, lol what are feelings, the way Jaemin stares at Jeno makes my heart melt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 15:58:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14216673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aches/pseuds/aches
Summary: Sometimes people come back.(They always do.)





	Heaven

Big, bright lanterns lined the driveway, which was filled with white-topped cars dressed for the occasion. In front stood the doors of a glorious white mansion, with a black sun-bleached roof, and surrounded by gardens. Men, women and children filtered out of the many metal doors of the vehicles, flocking like ants toward food. They, like the cars, wore white and shone, with rhinestones lining their jackets and dress skirts.

Something out of the late nineteenth century lay in front of Jeno’s eyes as he stepped from his father’s car with the grace of a newborn. He almost let his jaw betray his emotions, but like a higher entity descending from the heavens, his father’s hand settled on his shoulder.

“Behave. We’re going to be greeting the hosts in just a moment, and I expect you to uphold our reputation.” The lines streaking the sides of his father’s face were deep and ridden with age. They were usually the only thing he noticed, the only thing he dared look at.

Jeno wished he could be a perfect son, make his father proud and stand tall with the family reputation on his shoulders, but he knew he would never fit in. There would always be something holding him back, an obstacle he couldn’t face because it was attached to him.

A gulp sounded from the boy’s throat, a painful reminder of the reality facing him; he could not hide his faults, no matter how he begged them to remain hidden so he could save himself.

As Jeno’s mother stepped out of the car in her billowing white ball gown, his father moved to link arms with her and the group approached the entrance of the mansion. A man wearing a black suit, which identified him as one of the many probable staff working in an around the mansion greeted them, and Jeno’s father gave their name.

“Welcome, Mr. Lee. Your hosts are right this way.” The man at the door had a deep, soothing voice that made Jeno think of willow tree branches being caressed by the wind. Before he could even adjust himself, his mother and father were making their way towards another group of brightly dressed people.

Paintings and plants filled the entranceway, along with a crowd of people and even an appetizer table. Jeno may have even forgotten himself and let his jaw slack to gaze at the grandeur, but as it was, he felt nearly paralyzed. A wooden doll walking towards a fireplace without understanding the dangers of flame.

There were hands being shaken and a smile on his mother’s face matched by another woman’s, curt nods from fathers, even a wave from some familiar guests, yet Jeno’s brain seemed to be forcefully shutting itself down with every action that occurred. Moments were fractured and time seemed to be simultaneously slowing down and speeding up.

“Mrs. Na, it’s wonderful to see you again. We thank you for inviting us,” Jeno’s father’s voice somehow made its way into his ears, as it unwillingly did so many times before. Na. The family name struck the bell that was rotting and covered in moss sitting in his chest, and time suddenly spun in one continuous line again.

White shoes, white dress pants, white tie, white dress shirt, white blazer lined with glittering diamonds, pale skin. Yet–Jeno looked up to see pretty dark eyes already staring into his, lips pulled into a practiced smile, and bronze hair shining under the light of the chandelier. Na Jaemin stood in front of him, looking the same and yet so different, so foreign. Jeno forced time to stop tripping over itself, refusing to go back to the past. He nodded, as was expected of him, and kept his lips in a thin line, though he could feel them shaking.

“Oh, I’m so glad you could make it! How we’ve all missed you so.” Jaemin’s mother replied with a dazzling grin that resembled her son’s too much for Jeno’s liking. “Jaemin kept talking about how–“

“Mother. Sorry, would it be too much trouble for me to show Jeno to the main ballroom?” Jaemin’s face betrayed no emotion except for what could be mistaken as guilt. Jeno knew better.

“Oh! No, not at all!” His mother looked taken aback for a moment, but quickly brushed it off.

The moment the words left her mouth, a cold, clammy hand was wrapped around Jeno’s wrist and he reluctantly followed Jaemin out of the room. The last thing he saw were his father’s eyes, black and terrifying even under the blinding lights of the crystal chandelier.

After twists and turns through lit hallways, and then into darker ones, they finally ended up in a room that was too familiar for Jeno’s liking.

“You said– “Jeno croaked.

“I know what I said, but I had to talk to you.” Jaemin wasn’t facing him, but he was still gripping Jeno’s wrist, and his heart along with it.

A hurricane was raging through Jeno’s head and he desperately wanted it to stop before it ripped away his self-control. He didn’t want to be here. He couldn’t be here. Jaemin’s room, filled with his presence and all of their memories, was too much. He could practically see them sitting on the floor, smashing Legos together, laughing at the windowsill as they shouted obscenities at kitchen maids and servants alike. He could see them lying on the bed, talking into the dark of night, he could hear the conversation at the door that tore them apart.

“Jeno,” Jaemin’s grip on his wrist tightened and then he let go all together. The boy still wasn’t facing him, and it was driving Jeno insane. He wanted to see that face, the way his eyes crinkled, the way they stared into his like nothing else in the world was important. “I want to know why you ran away.”

Jeno’s heart was like a race horse on its first run, scared of everything and everyone. There was too much. Black eyes stared at him in his mind’s eye and he wanted to scream. He made a noise in the back of his throat, a choked whimper.

Jaemin turned around–finally–at the sound, and his eyes were shining, sparkling with beads of light like the chandelier in the entranceway, like the lanterns lining the driveway, like the moon beaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows. “I just need something–anything.” His voice was almost a whisper, but it held so much power and desperation, Jeno felt like he was reading Jaemin in the same way he read the music sheets his piano teacher had assigned him years ago. It was too easy.

Jeno gulped, yet Jaemin didn’t seem to be finished. “We’ve been best friends since I can remember,”Lego blocks and the pitter-patter of feet running down hallways. “And even–even if things are different, I need you as much as I always have.” Dark, empty rooms being filled with sniffles and words of reassurement, linked hands and the caress of foreheads. Jeno wanted to run far, far away. But his feet were melting wax securing themselves to the floorboards. “What I said– “darkness and open doorways and hushed voices, one of longing, and one of fear, splattered themselves against the walls of Jeno’s skull, making his ears ring. “I can’t take it back,” _I’m in love with you._ Everything Jeno didn’t want to acknowledge, the reason he had almost shoved a toothbrush to the back of his throat before coming, if only to avoid the memories, the feelings, _himself_ ; it all rammed into his chest, and his eyes betrayed him. “Because I don’t know if I’ll ever feel differently.” _Please don’t leave me, even if you don’t feel the same._ This is the part where he leaves, like he did a few years ago, where he pushes past the painted wooden door and stumbles from the house of madness, from the wonderland they had created together. His vision was blurry and it felt like a firecracker was going off in his chest (whoever said butterflies felt pleasant was the world’s greatest liar). The floor felt like it was slipping out from under him and the person he taught himself not to be was desperately trying to push his way out of his limbs and throat.

Black, black, black, horrible eyes. He shook his head and sank to his knees, trying to rid himself of the image, everything he had been taught writing lists in his head. He couldn’t. Nothing about this was right.

A hand rested on one of his that was buried in his hair. It was warm this time, and slightly sweaty. Jeno opened his eyes. Warmth seeped in through the cracks of his eyelids. Na Jaemin, in all his glorious beauty, was smiling sadly and looking at Jeno like he deserved everything he couldn’t have, everything he shouldn’t have.

Jeno felt something crack. He didn’t have to feel his chest to know it wasn’t a rib. Why couldn’t he have this? For once in his life, why couldn’t he have something he actually wanted? Did he want this? Jeno didn’t know the answers to any of the questions being born in his head at the speed of sound. After three years, he should have some semblance of an answer, but he felt just as immature, just as foolish and unequipped as he did back then.

Looking at Jaemin’s face, so still and so open, made him feel like he was in control of something for once. Maybe even something that could be his, and he was addicted to the feeling. His gaze trailed over the younger boy’s long eyelashes, the slope of his nose, the part of his lips.

“If you don’t move,” Jeno trailed off for a moment. “I might kiss you.” Fifteen year old Jeno could never even dream of being so bold, he would probably be jealous, but eighteen year old Jeno felt more than he knew what to do with. The words just fell.

Jaemin, younger by only a few months, gasped softly. His breath fanned over Jeno’s skin, causing him to shiver for reasons he couldn’t name. Then his lips broke out into a grin, forming familiar paths that hadn’t been used in a long time. Jeno felt his eyes crinkle into the crescents he knew everyone used to identify him from. Three years was too long for such a smile to be gone from the world.

Jaemin’s smile grew too, and a breathy laugh left his mouth. Jeno realized how much he needed to hear that laugh again and decided he would let himself have this for a little while longer. Maybe he could be content for a moment. Maybe he should be. Jaemin moved forward and rested his forehead against Jeno’s, and Jeno felt his lips pull up even further, closing his eyes in contentment.

The two boys sat on the floor, foreheads together and a single hand linked, until Jaemin’s voice softly brushed through the air again, “your smile isn’t as bright as it used to be.”

Jeno looked into Jaemin’s eyes again, unattaching their foreheads, and saw sadness and nostalgia there, but he also saw some fraction of longing that made his chest ache in a way it hadn’t for years. The way Jaemin looked at him, it was something so specific to him, only shared between the two of them, that Jeno wanted to trap these moments in amber so he could preserve Jaemin’s gaze for the rest of time.

He wished they could have more. They could probably have everything under other circumstances. Jeno focused back on Jaemin’s eyes and all their brown depth that held so many answers, he could practically read them right off the surface. They had always shown him the way. Could they still be trying to tell him something, even now? After he had shattered them, shattered Jaemin that one horrible year?

Without thinking, going by instinct and the need to repair something in the other boy’s chest, Jeno leaned forward and placed a chaste kiss at the corner of Jaemin’s mouth. Because Jaemin had been so patient and welcoming, and he probably deserved so many answers.

The bronze-haired boy’s eyes widened, but he didn’t move from his position, staring into Jeno as if he was looking for answers. Jeno looked away, feeling his cheeks heat up.

“Jaemin, I’m sorry,” the words were the most he could muster in those moments, and just saying them made his eyes tear up instantly with regret. The unspoken words, _I’m in love with you too,_ didn’t have a chance to leave his throat. Jaemin didn’t deserve him for even a moment.

A piece of Jeno’s heart came hurtling back into his chest when Na Jaemin’s arms encircled him and his nose was buried in Jeno’s neck. Jeno’s entire body was hyper aware of every point where they touched, but it relaxed when he reminded himself that this was also his best friend, and that at some point, they needed every part of each other.

“I already forgave you,” and the unspoken words, _I’m just glad you came back to me_ , left Jaemin and entered Jeno through the crook of his neck. Jeno thought that maybe, if he could stay like this for even a few more moments, he wouldn’t have to change the self he wanted to be, he wouldn’t have to conform to the rules he was never meant to follow. Maybe, if he had Jaemin, Jeno would leave the rest of the world behind and stare into his eyes forever instead.

**Author's Note:**

> One of my two besties gave me the prompt "your smile isn't as bright as it used to be" and I had to write it under a time limit of half an hour, but it ended up taking me much longer to finish. Anyway, this is the fastest I've ever written something, that's why it's not amazing, but I hope some people will enjoy it regardless.
> 
> Also, help me because I've fallen so hard for NCT and I can't get up, LOL.


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